This document lays out the feature and API set for the next feature release
of the Eclipse SDK after 4.3, designated release 4.4 and code-named Luna.

Plans do not materialize out of nowhere, nor are they entirely static. To
ensure the planning process is transparent and open to the entire Eclipse community,
we (the Eclipse Project PMC) post plans in an embryonic form and revise them
throughout the release cycle.

The first part of the plan deals with the important matters of release deliverables,
release milestones, target operating environments, and release-to-release compatibility.
These are all things that need to be clear for any release, even if no features
were to change.

The remainder of the plan consists of plan items for all of the sub-projects
under the top level Eclipse Project. Each plan item covers a feature or API
that is to be added to the Eclipse Project deliverables, or some aspect of
the Eclipse Project that is to be improved. Each plan item has its own entry
in the Eclipse bugzilla database, with a title and a concise summary (usually
a single paragraph) that explains the work item at a suitably high enough level
so that everyone can readily understand what the work item is without having
to understand the nitty-gritty detail.

Not all plan items represent the same amount of work; some may be quite large,
others, quite small. Some plan items may involve work that is localized to
a single component; others may involve coordinated changes to several components;
other may pervade the entire SDK. Although some plan items are for work that
is more pressing than others, the plan items appear in no particular order.

With the previous release as the starting point, this is the plan for how
we will enhance and improve it. Fixing bugs, improving test coverage, documentation,
examples, performance tuning, usability, etc. are considered routine ongoing
maintenance activities and are not included in this plan unless they would
also involve a significant change to the API or feature set, or involve a significant
amount of work. The intent of the plan is to account for all interesting feature
work.

The current status of each plan item is noted:

Committed plan item - A committed plan item is one that we have
decided to address for the release.

Proposed plan item - A proposed plan item is one that we are considering
addressing for the release. Although we are actively investigating it, we
are not yet in a position to commit to it, or to say that we won't be able
to address it. After due consideration, a proposal will either be committed
or deferred.

Deferred plan item - A reasonable proposal that will not make it
in to this release for some reason is marked as deferred with a brief note
as to why it was deferred. Deferred plan items may resurface as committed
plan items at a later point.

The release deliverables have the same form as previous releases, namely:

Source code release for all Eclipse Project deliverables, available as
versions tagged "R4_4" in the Eclipse Project Git
repositories.

Eclipse JDT (runtime and source repositories for the Java Development Tooling) (downloadable).

Eclipse PDE (runtime and source repositories for the Plug-in Development Environment) (downloadable).

Eclipse SDK Examples (downloadable).

SWT distribution (downloadable).

* The Equinox Project is part of the top level
RT Project. A significant portion of the Equinox
deliverables are consumed and redistributed as part of the Eclipse Project's SDK, Platform,
and RCP deliverables.

Individual, milestone level plans for the components that make up the Eclipse Project can be found
on the Eclipse Project Luna Plan page
on the Eclipse wiki.

Our target is to complete 4.4 in late June 2014, in alignment with Luna.
All release deliverables will be available for download as soon as the release has been
tested and validated in the target operating configurations listed below.

In order to remain current, each Eclipse Project release targets reasonably current
operating environments.

Most of the Eclipse SDK is "pure" Java code and has no direct dependence
on the underlying operating system. The chief dependence is therefore on the
Java Platform itself. Portions are targeted to specific classes of operating
environments, requiring their source code to only reference facilities available
in particular class libraries (e.g. J2ME Foundation 1.1, J2SE 1.4, Java 5, etc).

In general, the 4.4 release of the Eclipse Project is developed on a mix
of Java SE 6 and Java SE 7 VMs. As such, the Eclipse SDK as a whole
is targeted at all modern, desktop Java VMs. Most functionality is available for
Java SE 6 level development everywhere, and extended development capabilities are made
available on the VMs that support them.

Appendix 1 contains a table that indicates the class
library level required for each bundle.

There are many different implementations of the Java Platform running atop
a variety of operating systems. We focus our testing on a handful of
popular combinations of operating system and Java Platform; these are our reference
platforms. Eclipse undoubtedly runs fine in many operating environments
beyond the reference platforms we test. However, since we do not systematically test
them we cannot vouch for them. Problems encountered when running Eclipse on a
non-reference platform that cannot be recreated on any reference platform will
be given lower priority than problems with running Eclipse on a reference platform.

Eclipse 4.4 is tested and validated on the following reference platforms
(this list is updated over the course of the release cycle):

As stated above, we expect that Eclipse works fine on other current
Java VM and OS versions but we cannot flag these as reference platforms without
significant community support for testing them.

The Eclipse SDK is designed as the basis for internationalized products. The
user interface elements provided by the Eclipse SDK components, including dialogs
and error messages, are externalized. The English strings are provided as the
default resource bundles.

Latin-1, DBCS, and BiDi locales are supported by the Eclipse SDK on all reference platforms.

Compatibility of Release 4.4 with 4.3

Eclipse 4.4 will be compatible with Eclipse 4.3 (and all earlier 3.x versions).

API Contract Compatibility: Eclipse SDK 4.4 will be upwards
contract-compatible with Eclipse SDK 4.3 except in those areas noted in the
Eclipse 4.4 Plug-in Migration Guide. Programs that use affected APIs and extension points will need to be ported
to Eclipse SDK 4.4 APIs. Downward contract compatibility
is not supported. There is no guarantee that compliance with Eclipse SDK 4.4
APIs would ensure compliance with Eclipse SDK 4.3 APIs. Refer to
Evolving Java-based APIs for a discussion of the kinds of API changes that maintain contract compatibility.

Binary (plug-in) Compatibility: Eclipse SDK 4.4 will be upwards
binary-compatible with Eclipse SDK 4.3 except in those areas noted in the
Eclipse 4.4 Plug-in Migration Guide. Downward plug-in compatibility is not supported. Plug-ins for Eclipse SDK
4.4 will not be usable in Eclipse SDK 4.3. Refer to
Evolving Java-based APIs for a discussion of the kinds of API changes that maintain binary compatibility.

Source Compatibility: Eclipse SDK 4.4 will be upwards source-compatible
with Eclipse SDK 4.3 except in the areas noted in the
Eclipse 4.4 Plug-in Migration Guide. This means that source files written
to use Eclipse SDK 4.3 APIs might successfully compile and run against Eclipse
SDK 4.4 APIs, although this is not guaranteed. Downward source compatibility
is not supported. If source files use new Eclipse SDK APIs, they will not be
usable with an earlier version of the Eclipse SDK.

Workspace Compatibility: Eclipse SDK 4.4 will be upwards
workspace-compatible with earlier 3.x and 4.x versions of the Eclipse SDK unless noted.
This means that workspaces and projects created with Eclipse SDK 4.3, 4.1, .. 3.0 can be successfully
opened by Eclipse SDK 4.4 and upgraded to a 4.4 workspace. This includes both
hidden metadata, which is localized to a particular workspace, as well as metadata
files found within a workspace project (e.g., the .project file), which may
propagate between workspaces via file copying or team repositories. Individual
plug-ins developed for Eclipse SDK 4.4 should provide similar upwards compatibility
for their hidden and visible workspace metadata created by earlier versions;
4.4 plug-in developers are responsible for ensuring that their plug-ins recognize
metadata from earlier versions and process it appropriately. User
interface session state may be discarded when a workspace is upgraded. Downward
workspace compatibility is not supported. A workspace created (or opened) by
a product based on Eclipse 4.4 will be unusable with a product based on an earlier
version of Eclipse. Visible metadata files created (or overwritten) by Eclipse
4.4 will generally be unusable with earlier versions of Eclipse.

Non-compliant usage of API's: All non-API methods and classes,
and certainly everything in a package with "internal" in its name or
x-internal in the bundle manifest entry,
are considered implementation details which may vary between operating environment
and are subject to change without notice. Client plug-ins that directly depend
on anything other than what is specified in the Eclipse SDK API are inherently
unsupportable and receive no guarantees about compatibility within a single
release much less with earlier releases. Refer to
How to Use the Eclipse API for information about how to write compliant plug-ins.

The plan items listed below were defined according to contributor requirements and the Eclipse
Themes and Priorities
set forth by the Eclipse Requirements Council. Each plan item covers a feature or API that is
to be added to the Eclipse Project deliverables, or some aspect of the Eclipse Project that is
to be improved. Each plan item has its own entry in the Eclipse bugzilla database, with a title
and a concise summary (usually a single paragraph) that explains the work item at a suitably
high enough level so that everyone can readily understand what the work item entails.

Although there are three mature projects under the top-level Eclipse Project, there
is a significant amount of commonality and shared effort between them. In general,
many plan items involve coordinated changes to multiple components, and thus
attempting to separate the items into sections based on sub-project leads to
artificial distinctions between them (e.g., Platform Text vs. JDT Text, Platform
Debug vs. JDT Debug, etc.). As such, this plan covers the work of all mature projects
under the top level Eclipse Project.

Not all plan items represent the same amount of work; some may be quite
large, others, quite small. Although some plan items are for work that is
more pressing than others, the plan items appear in no particular order.
See the corresponding bugzilla items for up-to-date status information on
ongoing work and planned delivery milestones.

The current status of each plan item is noted:

Committed plan item - A committed plan item is one that we have
decided to address for the release. In bugzilla, this is reflected by
having a concrete target milestone assigned.

Proposed plan item - A proposed plan item is one that we are
considering addressing for the release. Although we are actively
investigating it, we are not yet in a position to commit to it, or to say
that we won't be able to address it. After due consideration, a proposal
will either be committed or deferred. In bugzilla, such items are reflected
by having a target milestone "4.4" or "---" assigned.

Deferred plan item - A reasonable proposal that will not make it in
to this release for some reason is marked as deferred with a brief note as
to why it was deferred. Deferred plan items may resurface as committed plan
items at a later point. In bugzilla, such items are reflected by having
a target milestone "---" assigned.

This work is focused on ensuring that Eclipse takes full advantage of all
capabilities of the underlying technologies that it is based on, be they
operating system, window system, Java or other. This includes support
for native accessibility, internationalization and localization capabilities.

Eclipse support for Java 8.
The next Java SE release is version 8, which is currently scheduled for March 18, 2014.
This release will contain extensions to the Java language,
including support for lambda expressions, default methods, annotations on
types and minor language changes.
In the Luna release we will provide complete support for compiling, editing
and launching applications for Java 8.
Work in progress will be made available as feature patches for early adopters while we
work towards the official Java SE 8 release.
[JDT Core, JDT UI] (380190)

Full support for GTK+ 3 where supported and successfully tested.
Kepler provided early access for GTK+ 3 with GTK+ 2 being the recommended version. With this
release we will provide full support for GTK+ 3 and ship that as our default version on those
platforms where it is supported and successfully tested.
[SWT] (340067)

(new)
SWT browser currency.
Significant work is required in the SWT browser widget to support the latest
browser runtimes. As part of this effort we will add browser support for XULRunner 24.
[SWT] (422561)

(new)
Introduce Java annotations to express API rules.
Currently, PDE API Tools API rules are defined in Javadoc using pre-defined Javadoc tags. These days,
such additional information is usually expressed using Java annotations. With Luna we plan to define
a set of annotations to express API rules and adjust PDE API Tools to recognized those annotations.
[PDE API Tools] (415607)

None at this time.

None at this time.

As the basis for the entire Eclipse eco-system, the Eclipse SDK must be robust,
flexible and secure. This work will address those issues by providing API for
missing or currently internal functionality, and focusing on the issues that
affect the stability of the platform.

(new)
Common build infrastructure.
The Eclipse Foundation has established a common build infrastructure to
be used by Eclipse projects. The aim is to simplify the build process, and establish
a common set of build technology and hardware across Eclipse projects. We made most
of the transition during Kepler but are not complete yet. This will make it easier for anyone to fetch,
build and test the Eclipse Platform on any machine, and lower the long term maintenance
cost of building older versions of Eclipse projects.
[Platform Releng] (372792)

(new)
Recruit and train new contributors.
While adoption and use of the Eclipse Platform increases every year,
there has been a steadily declining rate of contribution back to the
platform's development. We will work to reduce any real or perceived barriers
to contribution, and increase efforts on reviewing patches and mentoring
new contributors, with the goal that they become active committers.
[All components] (422762)

None at this time.

(new)
Performance and stability of Platform user interface.
Version 4.3 of the Eclipse Platform still has some performance and
functional shortcomings compared to the old 3.x generation of the platform.
We will work to root out and eliminate these remaining bugs to increase
the overall quality and performance of the 4.x generation platform.
[Platform UI] (422467)

(new)
Revive performance tests.
After the migration to CBI and build.eclipse.org, our performance tests stopped working. With
this release we want to create a stable performance test infrastructure and bring back to live at least the
most relevant performance tests.
[Platform Releng] (374441)

In the table below, the "4.4 minimum execution environment"
column indicates the minimum Java class library requirements of each bundle
for the 4.4 release, where the value is one of:

Entry

Meaning

F1.0

J2ME Foundation 1.0 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on
Foundation 1.0 or greater. Note that with the exception of some MicroEdition
IO classes, Foundation 1.0 is a subset of J2SE 1.3.

F1.1

J2ME Foundation 1.1 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on
Foundation 1.1 or greater. Note that with the exception of some MicroEdition
IO classes, Foundation 1.1 is a subset of J2SE 1.4.

1.2

J2SE 1.2 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on JSE 1.2 or
greater.

1.3

J2SE 1.3 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on JSE 1.3 or
greater.

1.4

J2SE 1.4 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on JSE 1.4 or
greater.

1.5

Java SE 5 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on Java SE 5 or
greater.

1.6

Java SE 6 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on Java SE 6 or
greater.

1.7

Java SE 7 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on Java SE 7 or
greater.

1.8

Java SE 8 - indicates that the bundle can only be run on Java SE 8 or
greater.

n/a

Unknown at the time of this revision.

Table of minimum execution environments by bundle. (See also the
Equinox Project plan
for the execution environment requirements of bundles contributed via that project.)